Features

Nobody likes a fake. I mean come on, who really does? Don’t you prefer genuine people who are genuinely interested in what you have to say and vice versa. That is the natural way to make a connection in both personal and business life.

Yet so many people turn up to networking meet ups with the sole intention of either handing out as many business cards as possible in a whirl wind of spin and be gone or are the type who, upon realising the person they are talking to isn’t an actual direct sales prospect, try to get out of the conversation as quickly as possible and move on.

You know the type “Oh is that the time”, “Oh excuse me for a moment, I see my friend” or the classic “that’s great, that’s great OK well nice meeting you Darren, I mean David, er, bye”.

This despite some of the most important business relationships coming from simply being genuine with people. They may not be your prospect but they will no someone who will be, and they will know someone who will be and so on and so forth.

By being genuine and yourself (and not the snake) with such people, you stand a much better chance of building solid relationships and a referral business.

It all comes back to doing good onto others. Reciprocity as we call it in marketing. What works offline also works online.

Read more about it in this article in Entreprenuer mag:
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/251485

OK so the above title is not quite Bill Clinton level “It’s the economy stupid” political sloganeering, but it still rings true for small businesses online. Do you ever ask yourself what makes a small business stand out? Why customers remain loyal in the face of price undercutting from the big boys?

Well it really comes down to your value add and the personal experience dealing with a small business brings. We all know that if we complain to the big behemoth in the sky then really the person at the end of the line at the call centre really doesn’t give a rats ass.

Whereas the small business owner takes any kind of complaint or criticism to heart as they know reputation, both the businesses and their’s personally, is on the line and they need to do something about it.

Project the personal touch

It’s the same online. You need to project the personal touch to your customers and not hide behind the faceless identity making yourself seem bigger than you are. It’s about crafting a story that is both honest and genuine so you connect with the customers you want.

So whether that me through blogging, social networking, the photos you take or the videos you share, it’s vitally important that your personality be front and centre as the new prospect navigates the information about your company.

It was actually the following article that got me reflecting on this as this has always been the advise we give to our SME clients. Take a read and let me know in the comments section what you think:

http://yodleinsights.com/show-the-softer-side-of-your-small-biz/

So it looks like the magic 140 character limit on Twitter is about to change. Whilst it’s still unofficial, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that the powers that be are looking into giving special dispensation to users to extend some tweets to more than 140 characters.

Will this ultimately change the nature of the beast? After all, if you want full commentary pieces you go to a full blog rather than a micro blogging platform.

That said, a little leeway to periodic “I’ve got more to say on the subject” style tweets could be healthy for debate and I for one would back the move so long as it is limited in user frequency. Watch this space.

Read in full here:
http://smallbiztrends.com/2015/10/twitter-140-character-limit.html

Have you ever used social media to find employees? If you haven’t then you could be missing out. We’ve unearthed some absolute gems for our team simply by joining the correct groups of like minded people with the prerequisite skills we are looking for.

As the following article shows, this is something ever more employers are using to find the right kind of talent. Sometimes its just a case of thinking a little laterally.

For example, we’ve hired a bunch of wonderful editors and writers using certain closed Facebook groups where we know the majority of the community will be great with the written word.

This has been invaluable to growing at scale especially when said workers are native English speakers but based in countries where the average wage is considerably lower than the UK/US.

Time to think laterally and get on this trend:
http://smallbiztrends.com/2015/09/using-social-media-to-find-employees.html